On Monday, Taboga said he was pressured into fixing a match in Austria’s second tier, where Groedig had played last season, and that he was also forced to hand over 70,000 euros after he and his family were threatened with violence.

The 31-year-old’s accusations reportedly led to the arrests of several people, including the former Austria international Sanel Kuljic, on Tuesday.

Groedig general manager Christian Haas, though, has revealed that three of the current squad informed the club on Tuesday that Taboga had, last winter, asked them and a former teammate to take part in match-fixing.

“The players did not take it seriously and understood it as a joke,” ORF quoted Haas as saying.

Haas, who stressed that no match-fixing had taken place, said the club confronted Taboga with the accusations on Wednesday.